Week of February 24, 2014

Okay, this week was slow, but good. It went by super fast and this next week we get our transfer calls, and I hit my 6 month mark! crazy it's gone by so fast already. So here's the basic run down of my week. Hope it's not too boring for you guys:

Monday night wasn't too bad, we shoveled a lot of driveways because of the storm on Sunday, and we made a lot of phone calls. Boring right?

Tuesday was a blast. We had our zone leaders come up from Saskatoon and we went on exchanges with them. We taught the Birds that day and set a baptismal date with their whole family! it was great! We also had our sports night that night, and the new ping-pong table we got is doing magic. Too bad i'm still terrible at it, but i'm getting better.

Wednesday was slow. We went out of town to help a lady move her wood pile out of the snow. It was a good exercise seeing how i've gained almost 20 pounds since i started my mission :) and it was fun, untill I got hit in the face with a log. But it was a good laugh. 

Thursday was way slow, and we didn't teach anybody, but we walked around town and got a lot of potential investigators so that was nice. 

Friday wasn't too bad. We did a lot of planning and most of our appointments canceled, but rescheduled so that was nice. We drove out of town that night to a reserve to teach a less-active, but she wasn't home! She "lunched" our appointment! but it was okay seeing how we got to see the northern lights that night! They were very dim, and it was a bit cloudy. I want to see them in full force. Sometime....

Saturday was busy. We taught the Bird's again, and they ate up our lesson. They're a native family and have 6 little girls and so we have to always find fun ways to teach them because they go wild and climb all over you. We usually color or use abject lessons with them and they love it! They've been investigating the church for about a year, but never came to church. Until this sunday! We woke them up by knocking on the door, and so they came to church, and the ward just loved them! They had a good time, and hopefully will come back again. Also on thursday we drove out of town again to teach a less-active who fed us the best ribs I've ever had. (sorry mom). But he had a nice house and lives in the country side. I'll send a picture of the road to his house, because it's just beautiful! 

Sunday was great! we had the most investigators at church I've ever brought. The bird's came, so did Cindy and she brought a friend! Ever since we baptised Eric, he's been doing missionary work in bringing Cindy and her friend. I'm sad we handed Cindy and her friend over to the sisters. But we did because they would help them out more than we can. After Church we went and taught a guy named Warner. He works at the food bank where we give service. He wants to quit smoking, so we told him we would help. We just got a new no-smoking program and it's very effective. We taught him it, and left him with a BOM. He's really excited, and i'm excited for him too. Sunday night we went over to the Yawney's house for dinner. They are the best member-missionaries I've ever seen. We had dinner with Eric and Cindy and Brother Yawney taught them a lesson afterwards and we were all there helping out. But he's a spiritual power-house. I think he's part of the reason Cindy believes in God. Love it. 

So that's this last week. We find out this week whether or not i'm staying in P.A. I don't want to leave unless I get called to leadership. We'll see how it pans out. But i LOVE being a missionary. It's been the best education I've ever had. The spirit that you feel when you're testifying, and you can feel the spirit giving you words, and you feel it testify to the person you're talking with, it's just amazing, and I wouldn't trade that for the world, just love it!

Thank you all for your prayers and support!

Love you,

Elder Jake Sorenson

Week of February 2, 2014

What a great week up here in the Promised land of Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, Canada. Man I'm loving it here, I'm just exhausted but I wouldn't trade what experiences I'm getting for the world, and I never want to leave this place. It's so great. I know my emails are usually long, so if you really don't want to read it, you don't have to. As always. But let's start with some funny stories and some miracles that happened this last week.

Monday night was funny. We went to the Mall to find one of Elder Hindes' old investigators that moved up here from Saskatoon, but little did we know that the mall closes at 6. But we walked through anyways. We ran into this drunk native (a quite common occurrence up here,) and he asked us if we could give his friends a ride. We couldn't so we told him we walked there, and we had no money. He then looked at me, said I was a good guy, and that I was going to heaven. I thanked him and asked him how he knew. He said I had a huge halo above my head that was very bright. haha it made me laugh, but then he turned to Elder Hindes and said that his Halo was broken. It was hilarious.

Tuesday we went street contacting downtown and ran into this guy named Paul. He told us that he'd been looking for direction in his life because he just got out of jail. He told us he was very interested and wanted to meet with us, and there's not a doubt in my mind that he was on that street, at that time, for a reason. 

On Wednesday we taught our investigator Eric. He has a baptismal date for the 15th. That's coming up so fast! we had heard rumors that he might be gay, and we were teaching him the Law Of Chastity, so we were pretty nervous. But it went great, and he didn't have any problems. He's a solid guy, and there's no doubt that he'll be baptized next week. I'm so excited for him. 

Thursday was cold.The forecast was for a -35*c windchill. But it felt so much colder than that. So much that the natives here were saying that it was freezing, which doesn't happen often, even when it's -50* outside. So we couldn't find many people out on the street, because they were all inside. But after a long day, we were trying to set up a member present lesson with a Filipino member named Edison. He has a couple filipino co-workers that are non-member, and we know because they live accross the hall from us. Edison said something about one of them named Joven, he lives down the hall from us, and we got the prompting to go knock on his door and give him something like candy. We do service at a food bank every Wednesday and they get candy, but can't hand it out, so they give it to us. We got a huge box of crispy crunches and so we decided to give him some. We knocked on his door, and he let us right in. We taught him the restoration, and gave him a BOM, and promised him one in Tagalog. He seems excited about it.

Friday we had all of our appointments fall through so we went tracting for a bit. In -30*c. No fun, Especially because we don't tract hardly at all. But it was good. 

Saturday rolled around, and I was so happy that January was over! It was the longest month of my life! But we went and did service at Habitat for Humanity, and then drove out to Muskoday reserve and taught our investigators out there, the Bears. It was pretty fun, then we came back into town and taught our other investigators, the Birds. They have 7 little girls all under 12. It was a mad house! They're all native, and with native children, you can't have anything on you, because they'll steal it. They stole my scriptures about 5 times. haha but we went and colored plan of salvation charts with them, and they quieted right down, and the mom said that we should come over more often. It was great!

Sunday: We sadly didn't have anyone show up to church this week from our teaching pool. It was sad! But it wasn't our fault. But after church we taught an other native family, Michelle and Billy. We had indian tacos with them. It was so good. The rest of the day was slow, and I started to get a headache, but then I felt like we needed to stop by Tom. Tom is another one of Edison's friends. We stopped by, and he let us right in, he sat us down, and started to bash on us for worshiping on Sunday. He's baptist and worships on Saturday. We somehow turned the conversation around, and taught him the restoration. I don't know how, other than by the power of the spirit, but we took his bashing, and testified of the restoration, and he had nothing more to say about it. The spirit was so strong, and we knew he could feel it. He just lit up and was so thankful, especially when we gave him a Tagalog book of mormon. We invited him to pray at the end, and it was the most beautiful investigator prayer I had ever heard, he thanked Heavenly Father for us coming over and showing the new light unto him. I was so happy.

Well, this week was great, and sorry for the long email, I just have so much to tell you guys. I love it up here, and I'm 5 months out tomorrow! But that's nothing. haha, I love this work, and that spirit that was there last night with Tom, and is there everytime I teach and the spirit testifies, and I can feel it, and the investigator can feel it, I wouldn't trade that for the world.

I love you guys, and thank you for your prayers and support,

Elder Jake H. Sorenson